Tag Archives: Kids

Upgrade lunchtime with these six new products. Whether you're packing your own lunch for the office, or looking for a better way to send the kids' lunches to school –we've got you covered. These innovative lunch solutions just might be the best back to school (or back to the office) supplies you pick up all year.

These educational toys prove that learning can be fun. We've rounded up toys and games that will keep little minds (and hands) engaged and entertained.

YOXO

YOXO is a customizable building kit, made in Minnesota from locally sourced, sustainable materials. Use the interlocking Y, X and O shapes with everyday items around the house to build whatever your imagination can conjure up. Invent your robot hero with the YOXObot Orig building set. Shop Now

Siege Toys

This tabletop toy is a miniature replica of siege engines used during Medieval times. Using the scientific elements of force, distance, weight and height, these learning toys are great for playtime or lighthearted warfare. Shop Now

We all remember our favorite childhood toy (mine was an etc-a-sketch) and with the holiday season fast approaching, we're likely wondering what the most popular toy out there is. It's fun to think back to what was popular when we were kids and compare them to what toys are at the top of our kids', nieces', nephews', and grandkids' lists.

In the 1900's the most sought after gift were Crayola Crayons and between 1910-1920 it was all about Raggedy Ann dolls.

The 1930's brought on the craze of the View Master and in the 1940's, everyone wanted their own game of Candyland (still my favorite board game!).

The 1950's brought Mr. Potato Head, who happened to be the first toy ever advertised on TV and one of the most popular toys of all time. In the 60's, the Troll doll was the big hit (with a second big boom during their 90's comeback). Speaking of the 90's, anyone still have their collection of Beanie Babies? I bet a few of you do!

What was your favorite childhood toy?

Check out two of our unique toy discoveries: Perplexus and AFO Flash Flyer. We are asking you to vote for your favorite and enter to win one of these cool toys for yourself (or a cool kid in your life)! Check out all the details on our Facebook page. Can't wait to hear which toy is your favorite!

﻿What’s a busy mom to do? Tech to the rescue! Guest blogger Carissa Rogers is here to share time saving tips just in time for that back-to-school rush!

by Carissa

August supplies meteor showers, hot afternoons and the crazy of back to school time! Shopping for school clothes, school supplies and plenty of worrying about class schedules or the perfect-fit teacher are enough stress for any mom to handle. What a mom doesn’t need is more stress about her OWN schedule.

Food On The Table

﻿Throughout the summer, it's easy to fly by the seat of your pants when it comes to meal time. A hot dog at the pool or nachos at the ballpark work May through July, but once the school year sets in, you need a plan to sit down and enjoy meal time together. Food on the Table is a mobile app that helps you plan meals around the sales at your local grocery stores with quick, kid-friendly recipes and an organized grocery list.

VolunteerSpot

The last things you need on the first day of school are multiple clipboards of sign up for this, list your email for that. Imagine a free online sign up sheet where long reply-all email chains are a thing of the past! With VolunteerSpot, a room mom or teacher quickly sets the schedule of needs and parents sign up to help with a tap on a smartphone or click of a mouse - it will even remind them before the event. Magic!

VolunteerSpot is terrific for organizing classroom readers and parties, your library and carnival volunteers, soccer snack schedules and tournaments, or just about any other parent supported activity. Be sure to tell your child’s room mom to check out VolunteerSpot.com! And best of all, because it’s so easy to sign up to help, MORE parents get involved and that makes less stress for all of us!

When the kids head back to school, they also head back to sports schedules, music lessons, school projects, you name it. Which means parents head back to the mad scramble involved in making sure everyone gets dropped off and picked up (with the right gear in hand), not to mention volunteer stints, PTA events, birthday parties, teacher appreciation duties and so much more. If you try to remember and take care of all this yourself, your head might explode.

Cozi gives you a place to park your whole family calendar in one place, so everyone can see it – whether from a computer, a smartphone, or a tablet like the iPad. No need to sync; since all your family’s schedule (and lists) are shared in one account, everyone sees the same thing. Add an appointment, input the school calendar, even include all the times and locations of the soccer schedule – including notes like “bring the potluck dessert” or “meet at the front gate”.

﻿Back to school can be a calm and fun experience for everyone. Jump in with these techy tools to get your mom-world organized and take out the stress!

About the author: Carissa Rogers is a busy mom of 3 and blogs at GoodNCrazy.com and VolunteerSpot. When she’s not playing photographer, dancing up a storm, leading the PTO, or chasing kids to and fro she’s connecting, consulting, freelancing and lots of other ings …a mom of all trades.

August already?! It's that time of year when most of us realize summer is winding down and back-to-school tasks begin to near. Last year, we turned to our Twitter friends for some back-to-school prep tips and (since we found them to be so helpful), we decided to reach out to our Twitter friends once again.

Here are a few tips from some of our favorite moms on Twitter who are getting ready for that school bell to ring ...

Beach debris? Now it’s a buoy of a baseball bat. The Buoy Bat is a toy bat made from lobster buoys. Its bright colors and sweet spot will make this a favorite outdoor game. Buy the Buoy Bat toy bat here.

Getting ready to send a loved one off to college? We've invited Madeline, from Uscoop.com to share some decorating tips and ideas with us (plus they have a cool giveaway going on, check it out!).

by Madeline Moore

September, Jocelyn and I launched Uscoop for the college market back in January, in hopes of creating a platform for students to inspire other students through pictures in our “Campus Style Watch” and “Campus Cribs” and sections of the website. Our goal was to exhibit trends happening on campuses across the country relating to dorm décor and style so that we could curate students’ shopping needs with relevant deals on online brands. By working closely with 50 campus reps who provide us with pictures and content, we are now able to tell students what’s hot and let them get the featured look at a discount.

Moms, we know back to school time means bonding with your kids over duvet covers, lamp shades and other dorm accessories, so if you’re looking to shop for your kids dorm and want them to be up to date with hot dorm room trends, take notes from our findings below!

Top 5 Dorm Room Trends:

1. Decorative String Lights are a must for guys and girls to add a little ambiance to a room at an affordable cost. For a girl’s room, we especially love the lights with little white paper lanterns. (Partylights.com)

2. For a guy or gal, big Block Letters or Wall Monograms in your child’s Initials are the best way to spruce up empty wall space (Anthropologie; Dabneyleehome.com)

3. Organized Chaos; With such a small room it’s important to have a place for everything and with the colorful jewelry or athletic gear these days it’s easy to turn your everyday stuff into fun dorm accessories. Girls display their bobbles on jewelry stands and tennis rackets on the walls, while guys can put their skate boards and baseball hats on hooks on the walls. (PBTeen.com)

4. T-Shirt Blankets; Send your kids to school with all the memories they need right on their bed. We love these quilts, because it allows you to hold on to and display all the championship and travel t-shirts without collecting dust in storage bins. (CampusQuilts.com)

5. Colorful Bedding; this isn’t a new revelation, but what’s still very much in these days is colorful bold bedding that acts as a centerpiece for the rest of your room and allows your child to distinguish their style and personality from all the other undergads. (serenaandlily.com; anthropologie.com; pbteen.com)

We hope the tips above help you decorate in style. We also ahave some exciting news: In order to help you navigate the expensive and chaotic world of decorating your child’s dorm room we have come up with a week of exclusive discounted dorm décor offers and giveaways. Today, we are launching a sweepstakes sponsored by Serena and Lily where students can enter to win 2 dream dorm rooms.

UPenn girl dorm ideas

We staged two dorm rooms at UPenn for a guy and a girl, with the giveaway package as the focus to position the product for college students. We love this line of bedding and home accessories and know all the students will too!

Why is Serena & Lily the perfect bedding for college living?

1. The beautifully patterned sheets and duvets will brighten up any dorm room.

2. The sheets and duvets are some of the softest we’ve slept on.

3. The multiple color options make it easy to coordinate with a roommate.

4. The twin sheets and duvets fit on an extra-long twin, which is the standard for most dorm rooms.

Laurin Garcia, the founder of Jokey Yokey, has learned from her family that happiness is a choice. She believes that happiness is something you create, not something you are given. And that’s what motivated her to create something that would inspire people to celebrate, laugh, and be silly.

Laurin grew up familiar with the Latin American tradition called cascarone which is said to have come to the Americas via China and Italy with a bit of help from Marco Polo. She decided to recreate the festive eggs she recalls from her childhood, and she has made us smile with her creations.

As Great Britain celebrates its first ever National Happiness Day, we thought we’d share with you something that makes us happy. In fact, these eggs filled with happiness are just in time for National Stress Awareness Month which is April!

Jokey Yokeys aren’t just for the kids, and they aren’t just for birthday parties. They’d certainly be fun for Easter, and they’re highly appropriate for Cinco de Mayo parties! But they’re also wonderful for weddings, baby showers, graduations, and even corporate events. Laurin offers a standard collection of Jokey Yokeys as well as a limited edition “merriment” that focuses on a different holiday or theme each month.

Because Laurin makes these by hand, they are fully customizable. You can tell her exactly which message you want inside your Jokey Yokeys! Can you imagine a proposal inside one Jokey Yokey and messages of “I love you because…” inside all the others?

Laurin empties real eggs to create Jokey Yokeys, but she doesn’t just throw all those eggs away. Instead, she donates them to her local homeless shelter in Baltimore, Maryland.

The eggshells themselves and the confetti inside are all biodegradable, so if you crack open the happy outdoors, you won’t even need to clean up! If you prefer to party indoors, a few quick sweeps of the broom will take care of the confetti. The glue and the glitter used to make Jokey Yokeys are handmade with things like flour, water, and sugar to ensure that they’re non-toxic and biodegradable.

So go ahead! Crack a Jokey Yokey above someone’s head and let the happiness rain down on them! The confetti shower is said to bring good luck and good fortune.

I just couldn't resist a tour of the Lego booth at the Toy Fair in New York City. As a kid my brother was obsessed with Legos. Now my two sons, nephews, and nieces are all huge fans. LEGOs are one of those toys that you really never outgrow and I noticed that Lego fans are fanatical and can span the ages. There are websites and blogs like brickzone.net that speculate when new sets will arrive and provide support groups for custom designs. I was giddy to see the new products and get the inside scoop. Upon checking in at the LEGO booth, I was greeted with, "I can't wait to tell my mother I got to hang with a Daily Grommet girl today". OK, that had nothing to do with Legos but it did make the Lego tour even better.

Here's what I got to see inside the secret booth filled with new Lego sets for 2011. A cool Alien Mothership (7065) from the Alien Conquest series that actually has a sound brick and a handle so kids can run around and fly the space ship. I understand that this is the first building set to make sound. I like how Lego listened to its customers and added an arm or handle so kids can actually play with the building sets.

This is a picture of the New Cars 2 Legos series that is co-branded with Disney. These sets will launch in May right around the time of the movie. Notice the black boxes. Yes I got to see what will be coming soon.

Lego is also partnering with the Pirates of the Caribbean on Stranger Tides movie (available in May). Again, look closely at the box with the words "Confidential" on it.

This is the first chicken and goat for Lego from the Kingdoms series (available in August).

The Space Center set from the City series (available in August) was designed to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Space Shuttle. I hate to admit it but I can remember back to April 12, 1981 when the first space shuttle was launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to orbit the earth for the first time. I love that Lego is celebrating a little bit of history and sharing that with our children.

After getting the inside scoop about what's next in Lego world, I had an incredible dream to be able to partner with Lego and help them launch a new line. Can you imagine if Daily Grommet got to help launch the next new Lego designed building series. I would be the coolest mom, aunt, friend ever.

Perhaps you have read the articles or heard the news segments about the recent bed bug epidemic. Did your skin crawl? Ours did! Don't let pesky bugs of any kind get the best of you. Here is a round-up of three Grommets that are proven to help keep bugs at bay.

Mosquitoes, bug off!

Are you one of the "lucky" people who always seem to be covered head-to-toe with itchy mosquito bites? Well, with ThermaCELL you will never have to work about pesky mosquitoes again. ThermaCELL isn’t like most mosquito repellent devices. There’s no open flame, and ThermaCELL doesn’t contain DEET or any other harsh chemicals. Instead, it uses butane cartridges and a repellent called allethrin, which is a synthetic form of a natural insecticide found in chrysanthemums. The combination repels up to 98% of mosquitoes, black flies, no-see-ums and sand flies. The technology has been tested and approved by the EPA and the U.S. Army. Check out ThermaCELL Patio Lantern and Portable Unit (starting at $24.95).

Keep lice out.

There’s a four-letter word that strikes fear and panic in parents, school nurses, teachers and everybody else who has ever had to deal with its aftermath: L-I-C-E. No one is immune from these creepy crawlers that all too often infiltrate classrooms and other kid havens. Fear no more, the Bug Bag can help. This brightly colored, patented nylon tents with a hermetically sealed top will prevent lice from spreading to your child's coat or other belongings. Check out Bug Bag and protect from Lice ($21.99).